Off-Topic Thread vol. 2

[Arrendis]

@Ax_l_Thorne

And by extension of that logic, one should be able to see infinitely into space. And yet resolution is lost.

I’m surprised someone with a strong scientific mind like yourself didn’t consider that before posting what you just did.

I did. What’s more, I said it:

@Arrendis

Sure, you’d lose details and be unable to make out what things are at a distance, but there wouldn’t be a consistent distance beyond which, you just can’t see things anymore. Only beyond which, you can’t discern useful information about what you’re seeing.

See?

@Ax_l_Thorne

Your also assuming that a primitive race would understand what it is they were looking at with the two sticks, and have the necessary physics and mathematical background to explain it as curvature.

Nope, I’m not assuming anything about the primitive race or whether or not they realize what they’re looking at. I’m addressing this:

@Zeri_Shakiel

There was once a time that there was not a single shred of actual evidence that the planet that our smartest people lived on was not flat.

ie: whether or not the evidence existed. Which it did. Whether or not it was recognized is an entirely different matter, now isn’t it?

@Ax_l_Thorne

In fact, I would say that you do have a religion that you follow. The religion of science. And as long as it’s verified, you believe it. Nothing wrong with that, by the way, but it seems that’s what you put your faith into. So I propose that you actually do believe.

No, for a few reasons. Let’s start off with what religion is:

1 : a personal set or institutionalized system of religious attitudes, beliefs, and practices

2 a (1) : the service and worship of God or the supernatural
      (2) : commitment or devotion to religious faith or observance
    b : the state of a religious
       a nun in her 20th year of religion

3 : a cause, principle, or system of beliefs held to with ardor and faith

Now, obviously in this case, (1) is circular, so not useful. (2) requires the supernatural, so again, not applicable. That leaves us with (3)—a system of beliefs held to with ardor and faith. Is ‘science’ a system of beliefs?

The answer is no, it is not. Science is a methodology, a means of questioning beliefs. And the point of science is to actively, continuously, relentless challenge the things you think might be true. So if you’re aggressively challenging the things you think you ‘know’, then can you be said to be holding to those things with ardor and faith? I think not.

Next, faith is belief in the absence of evidence. Faith is the investment of belief, an active position, a claim of ‘I believe this is true’. The scientific method doesn’t really allow for that, especially in the absence of evidence. If there’s no evidence, you can’t make the claim that you believe it. You can make the claim that you think it might be true… but then you have to go and try to find reasons it might not be true. And you can’t claim that it’s even likely to be true until you’ve gone and demonstrated all those reasons why it might not… are wrong.

That’s not religion. That’s not faith. That’s questioning, and it’s why just as I can’t accept a claim that ‘God exists’, I can’t make the claim ‘God definitely doesn’t exist’. Only that if God exists, there’s yet to be any demonstrable evidence for it, so we can’t go adding this ‘God’ thing to our explanations of the observed data.